1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to audio and video production and presentation systems, and more specifically to production systems producing content having encoded metadata for presentation of the content using the decoded metadata to auto align the presentation systems.
2. Description of the Prior Art
Operations of the modern Home Theater and other content presentation venues have steadily become more complex. The days of popping in the VHS or audio cassette tape and hitting play are long gone. The equipment used in these early days often was limited to a television set, Laser Disc and/or VHS Player and in some of the more advanced systems, a stereo sound system. The operational options were limited, requiring a switching box to select various inputs to the television, which often was connected via RF over a VHF channel. Although the ability to switch from off-air programming to VHS or Laserdisc was easier to understand, it was still a point which was reviewed often in the home.
Today, while developing standards and technologies to bring home the theater experience, the industry has given the consumer a variety of operational modes and DSP technologies, allowing the consumer to customize their own experience. The same technologies that give the consumer custom options, also creates challenges.
Like many other appliances and technologies in the home, Home Theater has become a science, requiring knowledge of the equipment, it's configuration, and the variety of options represented on the media being played back in order to get the maximum benefit from the game, music or movie being presented. Operations can be made simpler by the investment in sophisticated remote controls, which offer multiple programmable modes allowing the signal path to be configured.
This however is not often enough when the media being played contains an additional variety of modes, which can be confusing to many consumers. It also requires the sophisticated viewer to access menus of equipment items in order to optimize the viewing experience. Often the result is to not change anything except for basic modes, or modes changed via the sophisticated remote for the fear of getting into an undesirable configuration that may be detrimental to the media being displayed. This unfortunate choice results in many of the more creative operational modes included by manufactures of Home Theater equipment never being utilized, and the consumers who make the choice to experiment, being even less familiar with the expensive equipment installed in the home often must seek assistance to configure the system correctly.
While the variety of equipment manufactured represents, in general, a higher quality standard today as compared to equipment 10 years ago, there remains a differentiation between bright pictures and loud sounds and reproduction of the art both visually and audibly. The dollars spent on equipment are often made with operational consideration in mind. However, the consumer must still apply specific knowledge about the equipment and the media in order for the optimized experience to be realized. The control mechanism of the devices are becoming increasingly more complex and sophisticated. Viewed individually, the control methodologies used ranged from simple remote controllers to remote controller with “soft keys” to user input devices such as wireless keyboard and other sophisticated control devices. Yet, the underlying problem of controlling multiple CE devices to provide the end user his/her desired functions has not been made easier. Indeed, the resultant lack of interoperability among the diversity of CE devices with often overlapping functions threatens the future growth of the industry as a whole.
Some consumers long for a return to the days of placing the media in a player, pressing play and receiving the best picture and/or sound experience. What is needed is a method and apparatus for automatically configuring content presentation apparatus of a venue to provide an optimized presentation.